Painted woolly bats are striking orange bats that live in woodlands and agricultural fields across South and Southeast Asia. They are not only a bright, beautiful color but also have a cute, furry face. Because of these traits, some people kill these bats, stuff them, frame them, and sell them as decorations on e-commerce platforms like eBay and Etsy.
A painted woolly bat. Image by Abu Hamas via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).
Meet the painted woolly bat
- Scientific name: Kerivoula picta
- Live either alone or in pairs with their young
- Called aerial hawkers because they catch insects in the air
- Use their interfemoral membrane (webbing between their tail and legs) as a net to scoop insects from the air
Conservation scientists from the IUCN Bat Specialist Group looked online and found more than 800 dead bats — a quarter of them painted woolly bats — stuffed, framed, and for sale over a three-month period. The scientists were alarmed! Painted bats are found over a large part of Asia, but their population sizes are small. Hunting them for decorations could wipe them out quickly.
Bat scientists and conservation groups spread awareness that stuffed bats were being sold online. By August 2024, eBay and Etsy had banned the sale of bat products.
Joanna Coleman is a conservation biologist from the IUCN Bat Specialist Group. She and her fellow bat scientists helped get the sales of the stuffed bats banned. “You feel, in conservation, that you’re fighting a losing battle, but it’s not always a losing battle,” explains Joanna Coleman.
More learning resources
BBC: Video of painted bat in motion
David Brown adapted this article for Mongabay Kids. It is based on an article by Spoorthy Raman, published on Mongabay News.
